Watchtower Approved Blood Transfusions

The Watchtower and Jehovah’s Witnesses in general still cling to the “no blood” mantra. As you will see in this section, that claim is extraordinarily dishonest. The Watchtower has approved the use of all red cell, white cell, platelet and plasma derivatives. The list of blood products Jehovah’s Witnesses can choose to use in good conscience has grown larger and larger over the last three decades. If fact, the list has become so extensive, it’s easier to say what they don’t permit:

We will break down each of these components in some detail below as well as look at various medical procedures and blood transfusions currently approved by the Watchtower for Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Red Blood Cells – Not Approved

Photo by N.I.H.

The red cell is by far the largest component of blood, comprising about 45% of its volume. A red cell is a tiny doughnut shaped bag of hemoglobin as shown here. It has no nucleus and serves to transport hemoglobin throughout the body. The membrane accounts for only 1% of the total weight of the red cell.1

Hemoglobin Solution

Hemoglobin (Approved): Hemoglobin is the essential protein responsible for the transport of oxygen and carbon dioxide and is the major component of blood. This Hemoglobin accounts for about 96% of the weight of a red cell. Its approval for use by the Watchtower back in 2000 was startling to long-time observers and most Jehovah’s Witnesses alike. At present Hemoglobin based blood products like Hemopure remain in the research and development stage in most countries (except South Africa), although there are plenty of documented cases of Jehovah’s Witnesses using these products – at times on an emergency compassionate use basis.

White Blood Cells – Not Approved

Nat. Cancer Inst.

There are five different leukocytes or white cells that can be found in the blood stream. These are part of the immune system and fight foreign invaders like viruses and bacteria. In total they comprise about 1% of the blood volume in a healthy person. They are occasionally prescribed for infections that don’t respond to antibiotics. White cells are banned but all the ingredients and derivatives are all permitted.

Platelets – Not Approved

Nat. Cancer Inst.

Also referred to as “thrombocytes”, they are specialized blood cells responsible for stopping bleeding. Like the red cell, they have no nucleus. They are the smallest of the blood components, amounting to far less than 1% of blood volume, yet they remain banned. They are used to treat Thrombocytopenia, side effects of chemotherapy or a low platelet count due to lumbar puncture or bone marrow aspiration. The platelet is banned for Jehovah’s Witnesses but like the red and white cell, everything within it are permitted.

Platelet Gel (Approved): Derived from the patients own blood by separating the platelets via centrifuge and special processing. Used for surgical wound healing. This amounts to autologous blood transfusion.

Plasma – Not Approved

Plasma is a yellowish fluid containing about 92% water, 7% proteins, clotting factors, salt, sugars, fats, hormones and vitamins. Concentrates of the specifics proteins are prepared from huge pools of Plasma through a process known as fractionation developed during World War II. They are heat-treated and/or solvent detergent-treated to kill certain viruses, including HIV and hepatitis B and C. Plasma derivatives include:

Albumin (Approved): Blood contains about 2.2 % albumin by volume. (White Cells – which are prohibited – comprise about 1% of blood volume). Many Witnesses are puzzled as to why some larger blood components are permitted and some smaller ones are forbidden. The red blood cell stimulant EPO is an albumin based blood product.1

Albumin is often used to treat burns. A typical treatment for third degree burns (30-50 %) requires 600 grams of albumin. Producing this amount requires about 45 liters of whole blood. How can anyone call this “a small fraction?”

It is also obvious that the blood used to derive albumin is not ‘poured out,’ but stored, which is prohibited for a blood transfusion but permitted in this context. It is of some interest to note the following comment from the Watchtower:

“While this physician argues for the use of certain blood fractions, particularly albumin, such also come under the Scriptural ban. . – Awake! 09/08/1956 p. 20

The Watchtower quietly reversed its position on albumin in 1981 leading many to wonder whether the previous ban on its use was from God or from men. No official acknowledgement was made for many years.

Cryoprecipitated AHF (Approved): The portion of Plasma that is rich in certain clotting factors, including Factor VIII, fibrinogen, von Willebrand factor and Factor XIII. Cryoprecipitated AHF is removed from Plasma by freezing and then slowly thawing the Plasma. It is used to prevent or control bleeding in individuals with hemophilia and von Willebrand’s disease, which are common, inherited major coagulation abnormalities. Its use in these conditions is reserved for times when viral-inactivated concentrates containing Factor VIII and von Willebrand factor are unavailable and Plasma components must be used. Note the following link from the Australian Red Cross and its description as a blood transfusion.

That Watchtower realizes this is a major component of blood is shown by their October 21, 2014 letter to all HLC committees in the U.S. wherein they acknowledge and proudly distribute the Dept. of Veterans Affairs Directive 1089(1). Therein Cryoprecipitate is listed among the major components of blood.

Cryosupernatant (Approved): Also referred to as cryo-poor plasma because the Cryoprecipitated AHF has been removed. This single blood product makes up a staggering 99% of blood plasma – hardly a small fraction of blood.

Fibrin Sealant Patch (Approved): Used to control soft tissue bleeding when standard surgical methods are ineffective.

Hemophiliac preparations (Factor VIII and IX) (Approved): Effective treatment requires a preparation called factor VIII, which assists in clotting and is made of the pooled blood of many individuals. The WTS has frequently argued that these are small blood fractions. In truth, however, it takes about 9000 kilograms of whole blood to make one 0.1 gram dose of Factor VIII. A person suffering from severe hemophilia typically requires several doses a year.

The Watchtower Society is not ignorant of this:

“Each batch of Factor VIII is made from plasma that is pooled from as many as 2,500 blood donors.” (The Watchtower, June 15, 1985, p. 30)

“Dr. Margaret Hilgartner of the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center said: “A severe hemophiliac is exposed to the blood of 800,000 to 1 million different people every year.”” (Awake! Oct. 8, 1988, p. 11)

More than 250,000 blood donations are required annually to produce the factor VIII, and factor IX that is consumed by the Jehovah’s Witness community. Huge vats could be filled with all of the human blood that is stored and processed to meet the needs of Witness Hemophiliacs. The Watchtower ignores these facts when explaining why it allows use of these “small fractions,” but cynically emphasizes them when it uses AIDS as propaganda against blood transfusions.

Immunoglobulins: There are many different uses of these vital blood products. We touch on some of them below.

Human Immune Globulin (HIG) (Approved): Used to treat and prevent, among other things, Hepatitis A

Rabies Immune Globulin(RIG) (Approved): Used to treat and prevent rabies.

RhO Immune Globulin (RhoGam) (Approved): Given to Rh negative mothers to prevent Hemolytic Disease of the newborn in future pregnancies.

Permitted Procedures

Blood Donation: If done strictly for the purpose of further fractionation for allogeneic or autologous transfusion.

Dialysis: Where the blood of a Jehovah’s Witness suffering from Kidney failure is regularly circulated through a Dialysis machine to be filtered and returned to the patient.

Epidural Blood Patch: A small amount of the patients blood is injected into the membrane surrounding the spinal cord to repair leakage from a lumbar puncture.

Heart-lung machine: As we have seen, in a Watchtower article the Society explicitly prohibited pre-operative blood collection for autologous transfusions, but allowed another procedure:

“In a somewhat different process, autologous blood can be diverted from a patient to a hemodialysis device (artificial kidney) or a heart-lung pump. The blood flows out through a tube to the artificial organ that pumps and filters (or oxygenates) it, and then it returns to the patient’s circulatory system. Some Christians have permitted this if the equipment is not primed with stored blood. They have viewed the external tubing as elongating their circulatory system so that blood might pass through an artificial organ. They have felt that the blood in this closed circuit was still part of them and did not need to be ‘poured out.’” (The Watchtower, March 1, 1989, p. 30)

Hemodilution/Intraoperative Blood Salvage: During surgery doctors use blood aspiration with automatic anticoagulant mixing, and the blood is collected into a blood reservoir. It is then drained by gravity into the blood bag, and stored in a lowered position until it is filled. When the blood bag is filled, it is raised to the top of the assembly, and the blood is reinfused. Although it is hard to see the blood as still being a part of the circulatory system, almost all Jehovah’s Witnesses accept the procedure once they are told that the Watchtower Society has approved its use, and that it does not violate any scriptural principles despite the fact that it is clearly a blood transfusion albeit autologous.

Labeling or Tagging: The patient’s blood is withdrawn and mixed with medicine, then returned via transfusion.

Plasmapheresis: Similar to Dialysis in procedure but used to treat Myasthenia Gravis and other immune system diseases. The process is also used during plasma donation.

If we add up everything in blood that is separately permitted it amounts to 100% of blood volume. Clearly it is completely disingenuous for the Watchtower or Jehovah’s Witnesses to claim they don’t accept blood transfusions. As we have seen in this section, nothing could be further from the truth. What then does it mean to abstain from blood? There is not and cannot be a straightforward answer to this question. In light of the information just presented, it can be seen that it is not so much a question of abstaining from blood as it is a question of what components of blood must a Witness abstain from and why. Why are Witnesses permitted some blood transfusions and not others?

Much like the religious leaders of Jesus day, Watchtower leaders are caught in a maze of legalism and nit-picking. Their prohibition against storing blood is hopelessly inconsistent. Many Jehovah’s Witnesses would no doubt see that the logic that permits a heart-lung machine, cell salvage or blood fraction also permits storing their own blood – if they were allowed to exercise their own judgment. After all, the only argument against it comes from a rule in the Law of Moses requiring blood from a killed animal to be poured out (Deut 12:24). Following the rule demonstrated that a person understood the animal’s life to come from God. Obviously, then, these considerations cannot apply to autologous blood transfusions, since no one has died. The blood is put back into the person from whom it was taken.

“The Concentration of Albumin is about 40mg/ml, an amount that represents about 60% of the total plasma protein.” Ibid p. 308

Comment: Since 55% of the total blood volume is plasma and 7% of that plasma is protein and 60% of that protein is albumin, then figuring the percentage that albumin comprises of the total blood volume is accomplished by the following computation: .6 X 7 X .55 equals 2.31 percent.

See the following WTS references for a historical verification of changes in policy:

17 Comments

Hello from Australia i am about to have a meeting at my local congregation of Jehovah’s witnesses in Armidale nsw Australia about the blood issue and am concerned that its going to turn out badly for my future . Please tell me if i am mad or not but our prohibition on white blood cells is mad because we are all consuming white blood cells from milk and dairy , its called somatic cell count . PLZ REPLY

Your argument is flawed on so many levels I cannot begin to address them so I won’t. What I do find amusing is that you also set yourself up counter to what the WTS – the ‘Guardians of the Doctrine’ – have stated is acceptable, based on whatever flawed and inconsistent line of reasoning they may use, by stating that the use of any blood-derived product is wrong and against scripture. According to WTS anything they say is to be taken as gospel since they are the sole channel of communication used by God so to make a statement such as you have is going against ‘divine arrangement’.

I wish I found all the information on this site amusing when life or death could be on the line for the people we care about. For the so-called ‘sole channel of God’ to be so inconsistent in its message on the blood issue is not how I see God communicating. How is it that people read the information here and seeing the evidence plainly stated from watchtower magazines noting the shocking changes that have been made such as the banning of organ transplants and vaccinations and now blood changes yet still not have their confidence in WTS remotely shaken! It is so alarming in itself. With respect, I despair at such comments as mentioned above and hope that my family will not be so deeply asleep in loyalty to an organisation that all ‘critical reasoning’ is lost to them. People have died for WTS bans that are now obsolete. How truly tragic.

Well if the WTS accepts Blood Transfusion they will recognized they have been wrong all this years and will be responsible of countless lives lost in the past. They will not allow it just for that reason, not HUMBLE ENOUGH everyone that cares more about following a misinterpretated commandment against their lives are just FANATICS nothing more.

I spoke to some elders and theyñ couldnt give me any solid scientific point about transfusions. They just stated the bible says the bible says the bible says and i told him that organ transplant should be prohibited then cause it has whole blood as opposed to fractions and they told me that the bible does not mentioned anything about it so is not prohibited and that a little bit of blood was not harmfull. One of the elders stated that he eats his hamburger bit raw, is a not a huge sin. I considered his comment an insult and stood up. I was in front of them, all worried, looking for a response almost crying and he makes those unpleasant comments. Also i told him lots of sisters go through breast implants and other stetical procedures, vanity was a horrible sin, and they told me it was ok. I am sorry but some elders do not have any education and they were ex convicts, ex whatever. They mentallity is limited to what they know and that elder told me that by the way he expressed himself. It was when i realized that they were wrong in their stand with blood issues. You can not put ur life in the hands of those who dont know much and are not trained. I can not comprehend how Jehova can be an evil God a God without emphaty to his faithful servants. A God that punishes when someone just tries to save his or her life. Is SAD that the WTS thinks like such and makes God servants sacrifice their life in vane. I am sorry but Jehova is a God of Love and forgiveness. He understands and i do not think he takes revange against his faithful servants who just receive blood in order to continue living and adore him. It reminds me the Abraham story, if GOD would been CRUEL he would have made Abraham killed his son but he stopped his hand. Which shows how much God values life and those witnesses that waste their life to follow a misinterpretation are sinners. I think. Also, is a SIN to believe your gonna PASS to paradise with no doubt if you abstain from blood completely, when other witnesses tell that to sick witnesses is WRONG they are basically telling the WTNESS DIE DIE YOUR GONNA PASS WITH NO DOUBT when the bible is very clear that NO ONE HAS THE PASS GURANTEE. Those witnesses are sinning thinking they are like chosen ones. Again, they DO NOT FOLLOW BIBLE COMMANDMENTS TO THE LETTER but they believe that by following the blood one is gonna save them. I often have arguments with them avout this, HOW CAN YOU MAKE SUCH STATEMENT THAT YOU GONNA PASS WITH NO DOUBT WHEN NO ONE KNOWS NOT EVEN JESUS AND YOU MAKE THAT STATEMENT? I do not want to sin against Jehova but at the end tgose who run his church are just SINNERS HUMANS like anyone else that make mistakes. ALSO I was wondering that the reason the WTS does not allow blood component transfusions is because by doing so they will be responsible of COUNTLESS lost lives. Millions of past witnesses have died because of that so allowing transfusions will mean been responsible for all those deaths, i can not even imagine the FEELING of BLAME and SHAME. How they will see themselves against SOCIETY and the public. Is HARD to recognize your WRONG specially when lives have been lost. I will assume that if that happens millions of witnesses will lost faith and leave a religion that caused their loves ones life. Is only my theory, either or, i am tired of feeling guiltynand from this point forward i am going to he in peace with Jehova and follow him not humans.

Most jurisdictions require physicians establish consent. Informed consent requires that the patient have accurate information regarding the risks and benefits of a procedure or treatment, as well as the risk associated with rejecting it. Watchtower has misrepresented those risks, instilled phobias about using blood, and placed members under duress to conform to its irrational policy via extreme shunning from JW family members if they fail to comply. These factors make free and informed consent impossible in many cases.

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